H.S. FOOTBALL: Greencastle-Antrim comes up short against West Perry

GREENCASTLE — Ultimately, it was too little too late for the Greencastle-Antrim varsity football team Friday night.

Trailing West Perry by 21 points with 11:53 to play, the Blue Devils rallied for a pair of touchdowns in the final eight minutes before time expired on the resilient comeback effort, culminating into a 35-28, Mid-Penn Colonial Division loss to the visiting Mustangs.

In hindsight, it was as if West Perry (4-2, 2-1 MPC-Colonial) managed to beat G-A (2-4, 1-2 MPC-Colonial) at its own game, playing a disciplined, hard-nosed style of football while capitalizing on the opponent's mistakes. Most notably, scoring 14 points off two Blue Devil turnovers in the first half.

"Our kids came back and our kids played hard, but we've got to get rid of the mistakes," G-A head coach Chuck Tinninis said. "We've been working on that and if we can start doing it we're going to win some games.

We can't turn the ball over and we need to eliminate the penalties, but I love the heart of this team. We were down three scores and scored twice. I would have liked to have had four more minutes to see what happened."

Entering the contest, it was no secret that quarterback Zach Smith was the focal point of the West Perry offense, conducting the Mustangs' veer-style, option attack to frequently deceive opposing defenses.

Friday night featured more of the same, with Smith carrying the ball 29 times for 171 yards and a score while passing for 107 yards and three touchdowns, two of which came following G-A's pair of costly turnovers in the opening half.

On the game's first possession, West Perry recovered a Blue Devil fumble at its own 46, with Smith capping the Mustangs' ensuing 10-play drive with a 15-yard scoring strike to Chase May, granting West Perry an early 7-0 lead.

G-A answered a little more than four minutes later, as a 34-yard burst by Ashtin Byers led to quarterback Austin Scott plunging into the end zone from two yards out, tying the score with 2:03 remaining in the first quarter.

The stalemate stood until Smith broke free for 59 yards on a keeper around the right side, being brought down at the G-A 1 before cashing in on the next snap to put West Perry ahead 14-7.

After exchanging punts, the Blue Devils again responded, this time with Hunter Szaflarski taking an inside reverse 46 yards to paydirt with 2:28 left in the half to again draw G-A even.

A three-and-out from West Perry followed, returning the ball to G-A at its own 34 with 1:04 remaining in the second quarter. With the contest seemingly going into the half tied at 14-14, consecutive Blue Devil penalties quickly backed G-A deep in its own end before the Blue Devils' second lost fumble of the opening 24 minutes gave West Perry the ball at G-A's 16-yard line with 42 seconds showing on the clock.

Page 2 of 2 - Two plays later, Smith found a wide-open Kurtis Rider lurking in the left flat, with the fullback strolling into the end zone untouched for a 21-14 Mustangs' advantage heading into the locker room.

Feeding off the unforeseen swing in momentum, Smith connected with Keeghan Morrison for a 51-yard touchdown along the right sideline to extend the lead late in the third before a 15-yard scoring run up the middle by Kyle Boose on the first play of the fourth quarter pushed West Perry's lead to 35-14 with 11:53 remaining in regulation.

Now down by three scores, Scott and the G-A offense began hitting on all cylinders on what turned out to be the Blue Devils' final two possessions, finding the end zone twice in the closing moments to keep hope of a comeback alive.

In need a large chunks through the air, Scott went a perfect 7-for-7 on passing attempts down the stretch, beginning with two completions to Joel Zola before hooking up with Byers three times in five plays, capped by an 8-yard touchdown connection to cut the lead to 35-21.

After forcing a Mustangs' three-and-out, Scott immediately kept the up-tempo approach rolling, hitting Zola on completions of 13 and 28 yards to set up a 3-yard touchdown run by Byers with 3:06 remaining, resulting in a one-score game at 35-28.

Following a failed onside kick by the Blue Devils, West Perry took over at its own 40, looking to keep the clock moving with the complexion of the game now in question.

Four plays later, facing the possibility of G-A regaining possession, the Mustangs elected to go for it on fourth-and-one with just under two minutes to play. Much like he had throughout the night, Smith lunged forward to pick up the first down, sealing the victory with G-A having only one timeout at its disposal.

"This is probably the best West Perry team I've seen in about seven years and he (Smith) makes them go," Tinninis said. "It turned out to be a heck of a football game and there's a lot of positives we can take away from it. We need to keep bringing the same effort we've been bringing all year and hopefully things will start going our way."

Byers paced G-A on the ground, finishing with 89 yards on 18 carries followed by 55 yards from Szaflarski and 54 from Adam Moore.

Zola reeled in five catches for 64 yards while Scott ended 9-of-11 for 92 yards and a score.

Defensively, the trio of Stephen Ernharth, Josh Young and Alec Waddelow combined for 18 tackles, with Ernharth forcing a fumble that was recovered by Bobby Rider at the end of the first quarter.

The Blue Devils will look to get back on track next Friday when they travel to Shippensburg (5-1, 3-0 MPC-Colonial) for a highly-anticipated showdown with the Greyhounds.